Seeking help in London can be a difficult task. You can call yourself lucky if somebody is prepared to stop their busy ways in order to help you with directions or anything else you might need. The famous British way of politesses and decency is now part of a by gone era. My wife and I have a little family anecdote about this. Some years ago my wife went into a local newsagent in order to ask the man behind the counter for a favour. She wanted a £20 Pound note changed into two £10 Pounds notes. Quite promptly the man replied to her with a forceful voice: “There are no favours here in my shop!” “I am trying to run a business here, not a charity, he added.Hence I was quite surprised when I made my way to the local Berlin-Friedrichshagen postal office. But lets start at the beginning. During a general short stay in Berlin I visited a former bicycle shop-owner in whose shop I had purchased a special bike some years ago. He and I had stayed in contact ever since. During the visit I told him that the rear wheel of that bike was currently undergoing repairs in London. Without asking, he informed me that he was going to give me a brand new wheel including the expensive hub gear system (worth about 300 Euro). “Don’t you worry, you can take it, because it is only taking up space in my cellar.” Having been on the receiving end of such unexpected kindness, my next task was how I would transport this huge wheel to London. For one, it wasn’t going to fit in my suitcase. So I bought some air bubble sheets and wrapping paper, safely wrapped it around the wheel, put my English tweet suit on and carried the wheel to the post office in Berlin-Frierichshagen, where I was staying with a journalist colleague. When it was my turn the assistant got straight to the point. “Sir,” she said. “Would it not be possible for you to insert the wheel into a cardboard box? It would save you over 20 Euros, because the way it looks now, it would have to be sent as an oversized bulky item!,” she explained. And then she offered to store the wheel inside the post office, whilst I would go outside to search for a suitable box. Try replicating this in London Royal Mail office, and they suspect a bomb or something, and tell you that they are not a public storage. Here in Berlin the lady not only stored the wheel, she proceeded giving me precise directions where I was to search for such empty boxes: The local supermarket, the TV-shop near the market, or the bicycle shop near the Friedrichshagen railway station.

I left my wheel and went on my mission to find that box. First I targeted the bicycle shop near the station. To my surprise I was not told off for asking, but the assistant politely regretted that he had recycled all left over boxes on the preceding day. So I tried the flower shop, but the boxes were to thin. Next was the other bicycle shop on Friedrichshagen’s main road. “You are lucky,” I was told. “Tommorow we get lots of deliveries. If you like we can keep you a an empty cardboard box!” A favour without demanding anything back, or having to moan about me asking. How rare was that in London. I went back to the post office to pick up my wheel and post two postcards. I thanked the postal assistants for their kind ways and helping me, but they seemed a little surprised. They only did what they would do to anyone, help you to not waste hard earned money. On top I was given a note with the permitted sizes and the rates to help me later. Later the wife of the colleague with whom I stayed argued that the postal officers are supposedly not always that nice. I could not help but thinking that perhaps it was my English tweet suit that made the difference. Perhaps it reminded people of that long forlorn style of English politeness? Or perhaps those who live in Berlin permanently fail to take notice of the good natured ways of their fellow local men and women in their expectation for nothing from anyone?

When I collected my box on the following day from the cycle shop I discovered a note at its bottom. I thought it had been left there, a remainder from its previous use, but I found it was directed at me. It read: “You may find that your box is a little large, but given a little bit of love, it can be transformed into a smaller box.”

The wheel has now been posted at its promised 20 Euro saving, but I think tomorrow I should send another parcel to London. Completely empty, with its only contents being a good dose of Berlin air. I shall then distribute this air in London as needed with the aim of helping Londoners to do loving small Berlin-style favours to each other.